Financial Oligarchs Fear
Glass-Steagall’s
‘Enormous Political Power’

May 2017

May 9, 2017 (EIRNS)—"Glass-Steagall has enormous political power. It’s one of the issues where you see agreement in principle from the far left and far right."

That statement by Wall Street bum Isaac Boltansky (Director of Policy Research at Compass Point Research & Trading) is the final punchline of today’s CNN Money article fretting about President Trump’s announcement that he is studying a revival of FDR’s Glass-Steagall banking separation act.

CNN Money puts its hopes on some softer "version" of Glass-Steagall being adopted. As Margaret Tahyar, partner at the big-bank-representing Davis Polk firm, told CNN:

"They all use the words ‘Glass-Steagall,’ but they have nothing in common with each other. We’re talking about a fish, a bird and a reptile."

CNN’s summary of these animals went like this:

There is the White House version, which top administration officials Mnuchin and Cohn have hinted could be "something far more relaxed" than the other two versions: the "aggressive" Warren-McCain proposal which "looks like more of an attempt to bring back the original Glass-Steagall," and FDIC No. 2 Thomas Hoenig’s "higher-fences," more "middle ground" version.

Likewise, the "Bank Watch" column of the Charlotte Observer, the leading newspaper of Charlotte, North Carolina, the second-largest financial center in the U.S., admitted yesterday, that for all the talk that this is just rhetoric, "it’s fair to say bankers in Charlotte are keeping a close eye on what happens." The Observer ruminates on

"What would Bank of America, Wells Fargo and potentially other banks look like under a new Glass-Steagall? How many Charlotte jobs would be affected? How are bank executives responding?"

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